1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to telecommunications equipment, and, in particular, to enclosures for housing and protecting telecommunications equipment.
2. Description of the Related Art
A building entrance protector (BEP) is an enclosure used to house and protect telecommunications equipment. For example, a BEP may house the components used to interface between a multi-wire cable providing telephone service to a building and the twisted pairs of copper wire for individual telephones distributed throughout the building. These interface components may include connectors, such as insulation displacement connectors (IDCs), as well as electrical isolation components, such as high-voltage/high-current plug-in protectors. The BEP may have two or more hinged pieces that define one or more different compartments within the BEP for such functions as breaking out wires from the multi-wire cable, splicing two cables together, connecting cable wires to electrical isolation components, connecting the electrical isolation components to IDC connectors, and terminating the twisted pairs at the IDC connectors.
A conventional BEP has one or more apertures in its side walls through which individual or bundles of twisted pairs are fed to connect the various individual telephones to the interface components housed in the BEP. BEPs are usually built in one or more standard configurations, each of which is designed to handle a variety of applications in which the number of twisted pairs or other wires fed through the BEP apertures can vary widely. Since an aperture is designed to accommodate a specified maximum number of wires, when fewer than the maximum number of wires are fed through the aperture, gaps will exist between the wires and the edges of the BEP that define the aperture, through which dust and other contaminants can enter the BEP interior. Even when the aperture is used with the specified maximum number of wires, there will still typically be gaps that will allow contaminants to pass. Over time, accumulations of dust and other such contaminants can adversely affect the ability of the interface components housed within a BEP to continue to perform their desired functions.
In some BEPs, rubber grommets are inserted in the apertures to limit the amount of dust that can enter the BEP interior through the apertures. Such grommets may be designed with removable material to increase the size of the opening in the grommet. According to these designs, more and more grommet material can be removed from the grommet to accommodate more and more wires as the number of wires fed through an aperture increases. One limitation of such a scheme is that it is irreversible. Once grommet material is removed, it cannot be replaced, if, for example, the number of wires to be accommodated by the aperture decreases, rather than increases, over time. The result is once again gaps between the wires and the remaining grommet material through which dust can pass. Alternatively, a new grommet can be used, but this would increase the cost of operations.